Beanbag Chair Website May Actually Be Run By Beanbag Chairs

By cwaltersJune 18, 2009

Eric and his girlfriend are trying to acquire a beanbag chair from sumolounge.com, but there have been some hiccups. Eric is a former retail manager, so he’s actually pretty understanding about how things can go wrong with fulfillment. Now that Mindy is just flat out ignoring him, however, he may have lost his patience. Update: The founder of sumolounge.com has responded in the comments below.

Back in February, my girlfriend ordered a chair (the Chief Rocker) from Sumo Lounge (www.sumolounge.com). After a month with no chair and communication after the original order confirmation, she emailed them asking for an update… but never got a response. About two weeks later, we finally got the shipment notification; several days after that, it was delivered. However, what was delivered wasn’t what we ordered. It turns out that that chair had been discontinued. What was sent in its place was a Sumo Gamer beanbag, a more expensive item. While not what we had originally wanted, it would do for our purposes. We were annoyed that we had never been contacted and informed that we would be getting a different product, but mollified by the fact that the replacement was more expensive.

The problem really started when assembling the beanbag chair. After following the directions and packing the liner with the foam, placing that inside the cover, and then waiting a day for the foam to expand, I flipped the beanbag over to begin fluffing it and noticed a hole in the microsuede cover. I shot Sumo Lounge an email, to which I got no response. A few days later, I called and spoke to someone who said I’d need to talk to a supervisor, Mindy, who would call me back in an hour or so. After two hours and no phone call, I called back and asked to speak to Mindy directly. She verified that the originally ordered product had in fact been discontinued, which was why we got the beanbag instead. She also asked me to send her a picture of the hole. I had already taken pictures, anticipating they’d be necessary, and sent them to her via email while we were still on the phone. She assured me that a replacement cover would be shipped out the following Wednesday.

A week went by with no contact, and on the Tuesday AFTER the designated I emailed Mindy again, asking for a status update. At this point, the replacement cover was finally ordered and shipped out to me. Four days later, we received the replacement cover – which didn’t match the original specs. Both the original chair we ordered and the beanbag chair we received are advertised as having machine-washable microsuede covers – which is an absolute necessity in our eyes. The replacement cover they shipped us was a spot-clean-only microfiber cover.

I emailed Mindy that day, requesting another replacement cover (that matched the advertised specs) and either a partial refund or credit towards future purchases to make up for the inconvenience. To her credit, she responded the next day promising to investigate and apologizing for the inconvenience. However, she never contacted me back. Two days later, I emailed her asking for a status update; this email was never responded to. A week later, I called her asking for an update. She told me she’d need to speak to someone in shipping, who had already left for the day. She told me both she and the shipping person would be in the next day (last Saturday), and assured me that she would email me with an update, even if just to say she couldn’t get anything accomplished. I then asked her about the partial refund or credit, and I heard the verbal equivalent of a blank stare. When I told her that I had made that request in the same email that I had asked for the second replacement cover, she admitted to me that she hadn’t bothered to read the whole email and would have to look into that for me.

I’ve heard nothing from her in the past week. In my frustration, I’m turning to you, hoping that you can help me find resolution.

Eric also forwarded us the email chain so far, and we’re not sure but we think Mindy might be kicking back in one of those beanbag chairs and playing a video game while she’s solving customer problems. Eric’s emails to her are precise and well-written (see above). Here are her responses.

When asked for a status update after hearing nothing for 11 days:

Sorry for the trouble I had forwarded your email straight to shipping they were to ship the replacement cover and reply to your request I do apologize for the added inconvenience a new cover is being shipped thx Mindy

When Eric asked Mindy to verify that the shipping department was actually sending the cover, and hadn’t just re-sent the original shipping notice (because it looked like a duplicate):

Here is reply from shipping dept sorry for the delay thx Mindy

When told that the replacement cover that finally arrived was the wrong part and wouldn’t work:

Oh my I’m sorry let me investigate will get it corrected I apologize for the inconvenience